Recording with Gigi Edgley. Issue #16

Like I said last week, the plan was to let everyone know what was going on with the project with Gigi Edgley. Well, after another very productive weekend I'm even more excited than I was before. I am producing her E.P. to be released in early November, and it's been a very rewarding experience. The E.P. will serve as a sort of "unofficial soundtrack" to a comic book she also has in the works to be released soon after. Earlier in the summer, my friend Brian Meredith told me that he was in discussions with her to work on the mentioned comic, and that she was interested in putting together some new music as a follow up to her single, "Poison", which she had released a few years before. Brian gave her some of my music
to sample, and she decided that we should get together to see if the chemistry was something that would work.

Since this was to be a co-writing situation I began to research her earlier work to get a sense of what her new songs could like by watching video clips of interviews as well as gaining a better sense of her personality (fun, sweet person), and what she likes by talking over the phone and via email. Technology really is a wonderful thing as we've been sending song ideas back and forth online, and as she would leave voice messages with vocal lines written for me to put music to. I had never written with someone this way before, and it surprisingly worked really well. In the first weekend she was town, we finished writing and recording one song, and we got a lot of good work done this past weekend as well. She will be flying back up in a few weeks to finish recording and I'm expecting we'll be really thrilled with the finished product. It has been really interesting and a stretch as a songwriter for me to write in a completely different style than my own for these songs, and I feel very thankful to be involved with the project. I can't wait for people to hear it, and without giving too much away, expect something in the vein of Bjork, Sade, and The Sundays. More news on this later...

I'm in the process of building my new website from which you will be able link to my blog as well as the myspace page, so that will surely keep me busy this week. Now that my album is done (and being printed as we speak), it's time to do a lot of P.R. stuff (like the website) that I haven't had to do for a while (my last official release was 5 years ago). Obviously writing and recording is a lot more fun, but everything else you need to do to let people actually know you have a record coming out is just as necessary.


Thanks to my Aunt Jamie for thinking of me at the store and bringing me one of last week's mentioned "Night Owl" pumpkin ales. I now have four, and that must mean I own twenty-percent of the Seattle's stash...

On Friday, I went to see my friend Greg Garcia's band 17TH CHAPTER play at The Tractor for what was an much overdue viewing. A cool fun band, and check them out when you can...

COLLIDER rehearsals continue to go really well as we seem to have hit a songwriting stride in the the past month with what we can almost say is a fully functioning set of songs. A demo is currently being put together to put up on a myspace site in the next month or so...

Next week I'll share the track listing for "Songs From The Orange Room", as well as talk more about the tour TJ SHERRILL and I will be embarking on the following week.

Finally, today is an independence day of sorts for all young men across this land as HALO 3 hits the shelves. Three years ago when HALO 2 came out, I swear it wouldn't be long until someone did a documentary on the hysteria and obsessiveness it can generate (I might know something about this). In fact, if someone does, the title might go something like this..."Halo: A Peek Into The Mind Of The American Male Via Conversations Translated From Xbox Live". Oh, how I've missed hearing 12 year-olds screaming in my ear to have me give them the shotgun...

Until then, be well!